


Hair of the Dog

by necronism



Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Gen, minor depiction or reference to animal abuse & death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-25
Packaged: 2019-01-22 20:22:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12490092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/necronism/pseuds/necronism
Summary: Being holed up along in a run-down slum of an apartment can take its toll on even the hardiest of men, as Frank is soon finding out through nights of simply shutting off and putting the world away in a box. Time and time again, he does the right thing with the dogs he finds, running their chips and finding original owners or getting them to someone more suitable – and it always feels as if he’s giving away the remaining piece of himself. There's one piece he wants back.





	Hair of the Dog

Perhaps it was the rain against the window that made the room feel hollow, completely empty despite the piece of ratty furniture even a homeless man might call generous. Every pitter against the glass, every drop that made it between the pane and the brick outside, Frank could hear in his own bones. It had been one of those days where even his drive to commit the layout of the entire city to memory seemed excessive. It was one of those days where only sound filled his thoughts and not a single word could slip through the static. It was a heavy, unforgiving pressure on his chest that made not only his heart hurt, but his ribs feel as if they were turning in on him. No amount of breathing exercises or doing sit-ups could ease the feeling.

Two days prior, he had brought a worse-for-wear stray into the shelter to have them read a chip. It was a shot in the dark but one that proved to make its mark; the hound, a burly mutt weighing over a hundred pounds, was still sweet enough to let Frank carry it around like a baby, resting its muzzle on his shoulder and staring up at him. It was a gaze he couldn’t shake, the days he wasted feeling the dog fall asleep at his side. Every time it sighed and its breathing regulated, something in Frank’s mind… quieted.

A cat wouldn’t have the same effect, he reminded himself, staring into the cages that lined the shelter’s lobby. Sad, yellow eyes stared back, or tiny, trembling paws reached out to meet his bruised knuckles. There was the stark contrast of a beaten man kneeling down to reach into a crate with kittens. A few people stared at him, thinking it was amusing or as if he had mental problems; assuming as they were, staring down at the animals helped his own hands stop from shaking.

“We’ll call you if his previous owners can’t pick him up, or anything else comes up...” They knew his name, or the name he had given them. This wasn’t the first time he had done this, helped. This time, however, was the hardest.

Yet, right now, he couldn’t keep his heart from rattling around his closing rib cage. There was a panic inside him, remembering how he had found the dog in the first place. Chained up to a chair that was bolted to the warehouse floor, his food (or what could be excused as “food” simply because the dog was desperate enough to eat it) dragged just out of range. Frank remembered how tight the choke collar had been locked around the animal’s throat, making each bark a weak wheeze and drawing in breath must have been a fight every time. Much like right now, he noted, fingers curling into the bed sheets.

Perhaps it was the repetition in the rain, with no concise pattern to how it fell. Out of place, along with every other thought, impulse, and idea right now. The fact he was hearing his own breathing and remembering the dog struggling in his arms to fight back, assuming the man was here to end its suffering or throw it back in the ring. Other dogs were in the warehouse but hadn’t lifted their heads at the sound of Frank entering, at the sound of gunshots littering through the freights; the shouting, screaming, cursing, followed by an uneasy silence. The other dogs didn’t move when he approached either, or nudged their stiff, emaciated bodies.

His own wounds didn’t compare to the animal’s, terrified the entire way back to the apartment. No one stopped him on the streets, never mind stayed on the sidewalk with him as he passed with a snarling, hundred-pound dog that could be considered starving for its size. What money he had available was put toward late-night CVS runs for bandages, antibiotics and dog food. A leash came later, when the dog even let Frank near.

It - or he - or Baron, as Frank called him, lorded over half of the apartment with a crooked tail tucked between skinny legs. Frank would fill a bowl with food or water and shove it across the floor to him. It had been a long month of gaining his trust, avoiding his jaws or getting them looped into one end of the leash so he could hold the animal down and tend to the wound on his fore-legs, bleeding paws, and ripped ears. Baron had no doubt seen some war in the time he had been kept locked away in a nearly-freezing room with other animals. No doubt he had spent most nights wondering if he’d eat, whether the dog beside him would be at his throat the next night, or even be there the following morning.

As days of wrestling the dog to the ground to get bandages in place went by, the trust was built on a mutual respect and silence. Frank never found himself directly talking to the dog, but gave him the occasional glance and nod when their eyes met. It was a strange ritual, one he wasn’t even aware of most of the time. The few times he caught himself, he smiled and the dog stared lamely back before giving a yawn and a heavy thump of his crooked tail. Baron came to realize that Frank gave him food, water, a warm place to sleep, never mind the fact that the sores on his paws began to finally scab over, and his breathing sounded normal.  
Were dogs able to get bruises like him?

One night when Baron had passed out after a fight to get a tablet down his throat, he held his paws in his hands and gently kneaded at the worn pads. They were healing now. The dog no longer walked with an all-four limp, something he hadn’t noticed until the adrenaline and fear had worn off the poor animal. Baron mostly slept like this, hard and for hours straight, which gave Frank time to examine him for further damage… and have silly thoughts like that. If Baron had gotten into the same sort of fights that Frank Castle did, it would stand to reason he fought with tooth and claw and for his life. That made him susceptible to bruising, scarring, or worse. He rolled his thumb against one of the scabs, flaking it off and watching the dog’s closed eyes for any sign that he may wake up.

Frank opened his eyes. For a moment, it sounded as if the rain had stopped. Once his focus yearned for the familiar sound, it came back into focus and his eyes shut again. How much time had he wasted pining over a few weeks spent with an animal? All the days he was out of the apartment, living in some delusional state that a part of him knew couldn’t be sated - the past and the present and the near future, none of that could be fixed or eased with a dog by his side.

Eventually, one day, or so Frank figured, none of it would be able to shut off. He wouldn’t be able to turn away from the choices he made and that might mean leaving the apartment entirely. There was no time to run and grab his dog. There wasn’t enough money to feed two, make sure a dog got the treatment it needed while Frank still bit down on a belt every time he hooked a needle into his own flesh. He couldn’t put another life back in danger; it was the reason he worked alone and stayed alone, but coming home to Baron, as quiet as the dog had been, as prideful of his cuddling, it had been like breathing for the first time in a long time.

How long had Frank Castle been submerged that he hadn’t allowed himself a simple happiness such as a friend?

Something stung in the corner of his eyes, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. He sat up, running trembling fingers along his bruised cheeks. Right, that’s right, he was only human. No matter how hard he resisted, how deep down he compressed and stored those emotions, he remembered how hard it had been to say good-bye to his kids on their first day of school. The only difference was that his kids would come back home, like clockwork, and every day would be as safe as the next. Thinking back on small, trivial events like this only made the days seem longer, harder to deal with.

He found himself pressing the tips of his fingers deep into the sockets of his eyes until the room began to spin. That, accompanied with the verbose raining - fuck, it just kept going? - almost made the collapsing of his ribs tolerable. He could always go back, ask for a dog to foster - but then they’d probably investigate his living situation, right? Not only would they deem him unfit to house a dog, they’d no doubt find out his true identity and cart him off to god-knows-where. Having the dog itself didn’t raise any questions. Baron had been some undefinable mix between Rottweiler and Pit that made him round and lovable-looking.

Until he opened his mouth, or looked the wrong way at a piece of lint rolling across the carpet. That made him all the more endearing to Frank Castle, who had seen a shriveled, cowering, fighting mess of a mutt turn into an animal who might trust a human being again one day. It was more than a surprise when Baron had worked himself from the makeshift collar and joined Frank on the bed during a similar episode such as this. It was what had gotten him through that night before - simply having someone, or something, there.

“Fuck,” he growled, palms flat against his face. The pain under his eyes lingered, a headache forming just behind. This was the part where he’d find pain medication and take enough for everything to fall into a soundless, numbing throb. It was those nights he didn’t look forward to, set on sacrificing an entire damn day so long as it didn’t mean this was what he faced coming home: a nothingness.

 

“If you want to go back and see the dogs, you need to fill out this f--”

“I’ve been here before,” he interrupted, snatching a pen from the cup and scrawling a fake name on the sheets. He was told to keep it with him as he went back, shouldering the door separating the lobby from the pens out back. There was the rolling stench of rotten food, waste, and old water. It was to be expected from a city pound: where dogs came to die. Frank had brought plenty of fighting dogs unfit to take care of back here, some were familiar faces on occasion.

The noise in his head was deafened by the cacophony of barks, yowls, snarling, spittle flying to fleck onto his coat and face. Something he didn’t bother to wipe off, only glance in the direction of a future warrior to be rolled into a ditch somewhere. It was sad, but true, and there wasn’t much more he could do than relocate them and hope a rehabilitation center was willing to take them in. Frank had seen shows like that. Did they have patience for some of the scarred, ugly faces he saw through the chain-link?

There was a lull in the noise as he passed one of the cages, stopping to look in. The beast was a huddled mass on the cot he was provided, breathing uneasily and whimpered. Frank knelt down, hooking his fingers into the wire to watch the dog tried to exist in such a small, hellish place. Unlike the other ravenous mutts that only knew the taste of blood in their mouths, this large, but unpredictable one, Frank had come to know.

“Hey, guy.” His voice was barely audible, just above a croak, but only a whisper among the din. Leaning back on his heels, he checked the forms hanging from the cage. No name, no tags, but his chip was run and the owner had released custody of him. Frank took the papers out and slid them into his own pockets.

“They didn’t feel like dealing with what you’ve become, huh?”

Baron didn’t respond, beady eyes open but looking elsewhere. His paws, scabbed and scarred, were crossed under his chin, uneven and broken claws digging into the fabric of the cot. Frank knew that feeling all too well. It gripped him at the moment, trying to find his footing and find the words to apologize to a dog for leaving him here. For a while, they remained like this, until Frank rattled the cage door and Baron finally looked up.

A moment passed of the dog possibly recognizing the bruised, battered face of Frank Castle, unhooking his paws and slowly rising from the cot. It had been over a week since they had last seen one another, and since the call to the burner phone, being told that the previous owners either weren’t around or whatever excuse they made, it almost felt like destiny at this point. A volunteer watched warily, waiting for the animal to lunge and grab hold of the visitor’s fingers.

The limp was still there, each step a near hobble, but Baron seemed determined. He pressed his cold nose to the man’s knuckles and rested there. There was pride to be had for the other, determined enough to shove away the pain of walking to remember a familiar, safe, scent. It hurt to smile at the moment, to feel or even let himself be happy because of everything else going on, but it still happened. A part of Frank’s heart opened up, swelled for this reunion, and his fingers curled against the dog’s cheek, holding him there.

“Hey, buddy…”

With the adoption fee only being ten dollars, and the fact all Frank had to do was ask for the chip to be rerouted, it saved him some money to get a taxi back to his shoddy apartment. Baron’s hobble deemed difficult on the way out of the shelter on his leash, but his worm, healed paws didn’t touch the ground until Frank was setting him down, back home.

**Author's Note:**

> (I apologize if this is all over the place, I am currently trying to force myself to write again, especially for NaNoWriMo but I don't know how I'll do. So, basically I am just working on one-shots or finishing previous fanfics that I already have. We'll see how this goes. Only reason I wrote this is for a friend and because I'm currently going through some trouble with a pet of mine and it's been difficult. Phew.)


End file.
